


Drowning

by BloodyScourge



Category: VenturianTale Characters (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, Men Crying, POV First Person, Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Relationships, Sad with a Happy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:34:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26172025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BloodyScourge/pseuds/BloodyScourge
Summary: Johnny Ghost feels like he's drowning, it's a good thing he has a friend who loves him through all tomorrows.Alternate title- 'The Light Behind Your Eyes' by My Chemical Romance, Made Me Write This Fic
Relationships: Johnny Ghost & Johnny Toast
Kudos: 10





	Drowning

**Author's Note:**

> First Person Johnny Ghost oneshot. Heavy themes of depression (the feeling, maybe not so much the disorder). I wrote it with the intention of friends who love each other platonically, but you can interpret it how you want. Ghost angst, because I can. Didn't mean to make it this angsty, I got carried away.
> 
> The writing's not the good, but I will die before I don't publish this after days of struggling through finishing it.
> 
> tw- depression, self destruction, (minor) fantasized self-mutilation...? (indirectly, and not acted upon) ((he gets better))

I feel like screaming. Then screaming some more. Then tearing apart everything I've ever created, loved, and cherished. To tear it down, burn it, and grind it into dust. Until it was no more. Until this feeling was no more, and my knuckles will be raw and my bones broken and my voice box bloody and silent. Then maybe I'll cry. Cry until I am dehydrated and my lungs can't take anymore air and I'll be suffocating. Like I had cried a river and drowned in it. Because maybe that will give me the satisfaction of certainty in my sickness. Because maybe I'll finally know if I am unwell or just faking everything I've ever existed as, felt, or said.

But, no. _Johnny Ghost_ did not scream, or cry, or drown. I am not bloodied, my bones are not broken, and everything I have ever loved is not destroyed by my hand. At least, not directly.

I've just been laying in my bed ever since we got back from the last of our scheduled cases and after I choked down a mediocre frozen meal for dinner. I am decidedly not crying, apparently. I could use a good cry, but I can't bring himself to find the tears. One shift and the mattress is cold beneath me, chilling me through my hoodie and jeans. It was a good kind of shock. Like a cold washcloth on a feverish forehead.

After a few more uncomfortable shifts, headache inducing thoughts, and joints popping in protest, a knock decided to manifest in the entrance to my room.

"Sir? You've been there a while, are you alright? It's 7pm and you don't go to bed this early." I could hear my partner ask from the veil behind the door.

"I'm fine." Is my deadpan response. I can't find it in me to add a few more words to emphasize my point. I probably could if I tried, but it was much easier not to. Besides, even if I did, I'd probably end up breaking down crying. As much as I could use a good cry, the thought of sobbing in the middle of emphasizing how okay I am wouldn't do me any favors.

"If you say so, sir." A sigh, "I'm brewing some tea, Rooibos or Chamomile?"

"Hm, Rooibos." With the promise of tea (and maybe I'm just a bit scared of the spiders I have been finding in my room over the past few days), I slowly lift myself up and out of my bed, to stop at a mirror sat above my dresser. My face looks like it belongs to someone else, but I seemingly always carry the strange acknowledgement that it is, in fact, my face. I can't tell whether I want to cringe away or curse out my own reflection.

I nurture the thought of driving my fist into the mirror for a few hot seconds. If not, for the single reason, to watch it shatter beneath my fist. But I don't. Of _course_ I don't.

_God_ , how I want to cry. Whenever I try to muster the tears if feels as though something present, physical, tangible, stops their travel to my tear dear ducts.

It has been almost 5 months since I last went to my therapist. I have no appointments scheduled and I'm still not sure if I'll even make more. Therapy for me has been difficult these days. It leaves me aching and I can't bring myself to be honest, or talk about what I would like to. Besides, the thought of calling to schedule new appointments is an anxiety attack in and of itself.

Johnny knocks on my door again, and before I let him call out, I speak, "Yes, I know, the tea." Before rushing over to my door and opening it wide. He is standing there, unshaven with his hair mussed up. I must look worse than him, I think, and instinctively push a hand through my hair as my stomach tightens. He looks concerned, I must be a pretty bad friend if he looks like that while worrying about me.

"Are you okay?" Johnny asks me, giving me a once over with narrowed eyes.

"Don't mother-hen me, I already told you _I'm fine_." I retort with a scoff.

"I know, but-"

"But _what_? I believe the conversation ends there." Growling out, I push past him and make my way into the kitchen.

There are 2 cups sitting out on the table. One of them is my favorite, our company logo on a mug. The other has a picture of a cat floating through space. I got it for Johnny after he saw it in a Dollar Tree and begged me for it during the entire shopping trip.

In my eagerness to drown my sorrows with a comfort drink, I grab my mug and tip it back. To my horror, the liquid is scalding down my throat and the mug hot in my hand. Without thinking, I let go of the mug and sputter up what Rooibos was not already in my stomach. The mug shatters on impact to the ground and tea goes everywhere.

Johnny runs in a second later while I am still coughing and tears are gathering in my eyes.

"Sir! Are you okay, what happened?" He questions in a panic.

I stop coughing for a second to wheeze out, "I'm _fine_!" But, my voice is hoarse and nasally as tears begin to slide down my face and I want nothing more to curl up on the ground.

"It's okay, sir." Johnny tells me, grabbing a dishtowel and picking up the bigger pieces of my ruined mug. "There's no need to cry over spilled tea." He jokes, laughing emptily.

"You think I don't _know_ that?!" I shout in his face, and wipe my eyes with my jacket sleeve. "I'm not _stupid_ , Toast! And I'm not a baby who cries when things don't go my way!" Contrary to my words, I let out a whine and the tears continue to cascade down my face.

"Sir, I _never_ said-"

" _No_ , you never _said_ , but it's what we're all thinking isn't it?!" Why am I yelling? God, I really am a horrible friend. "That _Johnny Ghost_ is a worthless human who no one will miss! And we'll be glad to see him gone won't we?!"

"Hey, _calm down_ , sir, it's okay!" Johnny gets up and takes a hold of my hand, trying to rub small circles into it, but it feels like it burns and irritates my skin. I yank it away, contorting it behind my back in an uncomfortable fashion, but my hand still prickles.

Before either he can try and comfort me more or I can get a chance to scream in his face again, I wheel around and stomp my way back into the safety of my room. I slam the door behind me and my back collides painfully into my wardrobe as I sink to the ground.

As much as I said I wanted to cry, this isn't as comforting as I had thought. I am heaving into my knees, which are curled up to my chest, and every time I inhale it, my breath catches in my throat and I am choking. My limbs are locked tight and close to my body. They feel like weights and I find I can't move them at all.

I don't hear footsteps, or my door opening, but Johnny is by my side. He's not touching me, my eyes are screwed shut, and I can barely hear over my own sobbing, but somehow I can feel him beside me.

Soon enough, my crying slows enough on it's own that I can breath clearly and I'm not wailing every exhale. I whimper as I shut my eyes tighter and bury my face deeper into my knees. It's a lot more comfortable here in the darkness behind my eyes, that I wish I could stay here forever. But I can't.

"Do you want to talk?" Johnny asks softly by my side as I calm down.

A few more deep breaths give me the strength to respond. "What is there to talk about, Johnny? I'm _fine_. I'm not special, and I don't have it nearly as bad as some people." I choke out, my tears having yet to taper off completely.

I open my eyes and take my face out of my knees to look at Johnny. To my surprise, he doesn't give me a pitiful or disappointed look. If anything, it's a mix of passionate exasperation and furious worry.

"Sir! All due respect, I don't care about anyone else right now!" He half-yells at me, and now I've begun to shake, again. Preparing for a new onslaught of tears. "There will always be people who have it worse! Always! But I'm _not_ gonna let you be hurting here alone, pretending you're okay. Because, you're _not okay right now_. You know this! So, I'm gonna be here letting you know how much I love you and reminding you there's always tomorrow to be okay."

"What if I'm not okay tomorrow?" I sob, my voice is shaking and so soft I think a spider could make a louder sound.

"Then you will have the days after tomorrow too. I will make time stop for you, _Johnathan Ghost_ , so you can take as many tomorrows as you need until you believe me."

I sit there for a moment, frozen in time as I look him dead in the eye. Johnny's contradictory emotions don't waver for a second. Wordlessly, I uncurl my body, slowly letting every bit of myself relax out of it's locked-up state. When that's done, I shift myself into his frame, burying my face into the crook of his neck and weeping. He wraps his arms around me, holding me close.

We stay there until I'm done crying and then some. I whisper to him my fears and insecurities, and he listens. Not once does he stop embracing me, or downplay anything I say. My eyes are aching as I murmur meaningless things into his collarbone, and he's humming acknowledgement into my hair.

As I begin to drift off, I can feel him heaving me off of the floor and laying me down, into my bed. When I barely register footsteps beginning to walk away, I startle.

"Stay!" I huff, reaching my hand out for him, uselessly in the darkness. "With me. Tonight. Please." I amend, even though I can barely keep my eyes open and I can't spot him in the dark room anyway.

"I'm not going _anywhere_ , Johnny." He soothes as the bed dips with the weight of him joining me on the mattress. I turn to him and he gathers me softly in his arms.

"Thnks," I mumble, slurred from exhaustion and muffled by his shirt.

He hushes me gently, and I fall asleep in what seems like seconds.

————————

Waking up in Johnny's arms gives me warmth. Even though my eyes are aching and scratchy from last night, I can't stop noticing how lovely Johnny looks asleep, with the the sunlight behind his head. Like a halo. With a sigh, I close my eyes again, and sink further into my friend's arms. I deserve to sleep in.

Although I can't speak for tomorrow, Johnny can't freeze time, and nothing will magically get better without effort on my part, I can do nothing to stop the feeling in my gut. Against all odds, I think I'm gonna be pretty okay today.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, I know it’s pretty fast-paced, but it’s the best I got. Have a good day :)


End file.
